New Neo-Geo shmup -- Last Hope [also for DC]

Darius11 · Post by **Darius11** » Tue Feb 13, 2007 12:42 pm

Yeah, i got my ass handed to me easily to.

ROBOTRON · Post by **ROBOTRON** » Tue Feb 13, 2007 2:54 pm

DavidHolliss wrote:
Have you tried to another site like www.putfile.com ? prehaps the file is too big in size.

Thanx..I'll try that in future.

After some closely watched playback I figured it out (duh).

There are things that look like land mines on level 2. I thought they were part of the landscape...hard to tell the difference sometimes...you can't destroy them (apparently), I've tried shooting them, to no avail. If you get too close they explode or possibly jump at your ship. Thats why my ship was exploding and then I was like scratching my head...wtf?. lol.

tassian · Post by **tassian** » Tue Feb 13, 2007 3:33 pm

I had trouble identifying those little cylindricals shapes as mines as well. After a closer look I realized that there's also some sort of "laser pointer pixel" circling the mines. If the point meets your hitbox, you're history.

mirkvid · Post by **mirkvid** » Tue Feb 13, 2007 5:13 pm

quick impressions

"wow...my ship sure is slow....hey! how'd i die"
(repeat for 2 credits.)

"time to play third strike"

i'll give it more time this weekend. hopefully i can get into it.

Strider77 · Post by **Strider77** » Tue Feb 13, 2007 7:27 pm

How much does everyone want to bet that play-asia screws me over on the limited edition...

Ceph · Post by **Ceph** » Tue Feb 13, 2007 7:43 pm

Posted: Sun Feb 04, 2007 2:03 pm

max\DCS wrote:The release of the Limited Edition will take another week or two since we also want to improve the mistakes we were informed by gamers who bought the regular version.

The orange bar of the Limited Edition will be just like the other Dreamcast releases, sorry for messing that up with the regular version.

Two weeks will be over in 5 days...

hermosaguy · Post by **hermosaguy** » Tue Feb 13, 2007 8:49 pm

I'm starting to think Excelica will make it before my LE of Last Hope (which I will quicky sell off) The roomies original copy is already sold to some unfortunate DC collector.

tassian · Post by **tassian** » Tue Feb 13, 2007 9:17 pm

Strider77 wrote:How much does everyone want to bet that play-asia screws me over on the limited edition...

Why would they do that? Or better say: what will happen?

ROBOTRON · Post by **ROBOTRON** » Tue Feb 13, 2007 9:32 pm

tassian wrote:I had trouble identifying those little cylindricals shapes as mines as well. After a closer look I realized that there's also some sort of "laser pointer pixel" circling the mines. If the point meets your hitbox, you're history.

ah.

Ok, thanx....I see them later in the level too...near the end boss (I assume).

Tigershark · Post by **Tigershark** » Tue Feb 13, 2007 11:55 pm

First post. Been a lurker for some time but decided to take the plunge so to speak.

Anyways. Last Hope. Arrived today from VGI and I've played it for about an hour. Jeez. It's a bit too hard for my liking but there's something strangely addictive about it that made me want to keep at it. After playing for about 20 minutes I managed to get past the first stage on easy using loads of continues! I used to think I was quite good at shooters until I played this!

I totally agree with the comments about being unable to see stuff but I found that after a while you tuned into this and bullets etc became a little more visable.

Overall I'm not sure about this game. The animations are good and the graphics are just as good as (say) Mars Matrix and in fact look better on VGA than that game - but the learning curve is way too steep. I remember reading an article many moons ago that stated that if a game is ridiculously hard it was because there wasn't much substance to it and the programmer had to make the game last somehow. Is this the case here? Only time will tell.

TS.

ps. I know people have been banging on about the music but it's not my cup of tea. You need something a tad more uptempo (so I can play it loud to muffle the sounds of the expletives that regularly leave my mouth!).

Sundance · Post by **Sundance** » Wed Feb 14, 2007 12:02 am

Tigershark wrote: ps. I know people have been banging on about the music but it's not my cup of tea. You need something a tad more uptempo (so I can play it loud to muffle the sounds of the expletives that regularly leave my mouth!).

lol.. Welcome aboard. Glad to see you picked up Last Hope also. I'm enjoying hearing all the different opinions. I got mine in the mail on Sat but haven't been home long enough to give it a shot. I'll have to change that tonight and give my 2 cents.

Strider77 · Post by **Strider77** » Wed Feb 14, 2007 2:26 am

Why would they do that? Or better say: what will happen?

I preordered that when it was listed as available so I SHOULD get it. But play-asia can be shiesty at times. I have ordered things before and since one item in the order would be out of stock they claimed to "hold" my other items for the the remaining one to be in stock. Only they sold my other items and when the one item came in, they couldn't get back what they had sold in the meantime. This same thing has happened to me twice and to a friend also.

Hopefully I'm wrong this time... I don't hate play asia, they just aggrivate me at times.

SAM · Post by **SAM** » Wed Feb 14, 2007 11:38 am

I had pre-ordered Last Hope (DC Regular Version) at Play-Asia and haven't received it yet.

This is why one shouldn't place Trigger Heart Exelica in the same order...

Guess I could use the coupon from this order on Karous.

tekneekz · Post by **tekneekz** » Wed Feb 14, 2007 1:14 pm

for some reason i cant get past the stage 4 right at the beginning of the first check point, seem to me their is a hit detection problem or my copy, after the second dip of the stone where the laser dude comes down u need to make it quickly across before it closes on you. i keep getting killed by something invisible before the second dip?

soniq-man · Post by **soniq-man** » Wed Feb 14, 2007 3:45 pm

bVork wrote: Music: The music is absolutely incredible. It's like R-Type's sort of downtempo stuff mixed with classic Amiga. If the OST was sold separately, I'd instantly purchase it.

Blush & thanks. Let me think, I loved my Amiga to bits (pardon the pun) and I loved R-Type in the arcades (back in 87 if I remember correctly). That pretty much sums up my music I guess. No seriously, I'm glad this comes across as it does, as my intention with those tracks was exactly that: Old school style with a tick more modern production value. Slightly OT: If you like what you are hearing, why not drop by on my site and download some of my free demo and complete tracks? Judging by your taste, tracks like `Beyond the Frontier´ will be to your liking I'd say. There are also some older Amiga game remixes (Turrican and X-out), previews of CD work I did, plus a medley of Fantasy and Sci-Fi style themes. Enjoy.

Best,

Rafael Dyll

yojo! · Post by **yojo!** » Wed Feb 14, 2007 8:50 pm

This game is pure gold. I'm enjoying it more and more as I'm playing it. It gets even better once you play it on hard.
Little trick I discovered at the beginning of level 2; if you stay close enough to the bottom of screen (1 or 2 pixels away from the wall) the tiny homing missiles that get released won't come to you but will head straight into the wall instead. you don't have to fire once; the bigger enemies above fly pass by you also.

szycag · Post by **szycag** » Wed Feb 14, 2007 10:05 pm

You can just put the game in a regular CD player and listen to the music. It's CD Audio. The music is definitely the best draw to this game. I hope that's a compliment?

JBC · Post by **JBC** » Thu Feb 15, 2007 12:27 am

Wow! I got to the title screen in Chankast!

j/k... uh.

but no... i really tried. They have a 30-something dollar DC down at Bookman's i saw a few weeks ago, maybe it's still there.

(hopes upon hopes) :p

DBH87 · Post by **DBH87** » Thu Feb 15, 2007 12:42 am

on my copy theres a ring in the middle of the disc like its skipped a bit is this on everyone elses

Stormwatch · Post by **Stormwatch** » Thu Feb 15, 2007 12:43 am

Most of what's wrong with this game can be summarized as: it was made by Pulstar fans.

Limbrooke · Post by **Limbrooke** » Thu Feb 15, 2007 1:12 am

Stormwatch wrote:Most of what's wrong with this game can be summarized as: it was made by Pulstar fans.

Only problem is Pulstar seems a bit more forgiving. Perhaps more of a fun factor as a result. I never used to like Pulstar too much.

EDIT - After playing Last Hope: I've become more of a Pulstar fan, less of a Last Hope fan.

iatneH · Post by **iatneH** » Thu Feb 15, 2007 2:26 am

That's good. Maybe my copy arrived at my house this week, but I won't know until Friday.

I always liked Pulstar. Much more than Blazing Star, even.

Really looking forward to trying this game.

Sundance · Post by **Sundance** » Thu Feb 15, 2007 3:13 am

I just noticed a Typo... i went to enter my 3 initials at the end of the game i played and as i scrolled through the letters to enter: SUN, i noticed the letter 'T' comes up before the letter 'S'. Just a copy editor flaw but interesting none-the-less. That aside, this is a very unforgiving game and it took me about 30 mins to clear level one. But if you get into 'R-Type mode w/ pattern memorization you'll find a way to the end. I must say the music is awesome. Its definitely a bonus to the game.

ROBOTRON · Post by **ROBOTRON** » Thu Feb 15, 2007 4:36 pm

Some more impressions.

To those of you still waiting or trying to decide whether or not to buy it.

Last Hope is 95% memory based and about 5% everything else. The game is unforgiving...you make a mistake...you will die...no sweet, skillful last second avoidance, wowing yourself and onlookers.

That being said...I still like it. Its been a long time since I cursed this much at my TV screen. If you liked R-Type, Last Resort, Pulstar...then chances are you'll enjoy this one.

The music really shines in this game....top quality. Hats off to whoever did the OST. Graphically, I was impressed...it is also of high quality except for some minor irritations like debris and enemy bullets (hard to tell apart). From what I've seen so far, Creepy Waters is my fav stage (2). Gameplay/Control takes some getting used to, using the trigger buttons to control your option bit is tricky and CRUCIAL to your goal. You won't get very far unless you master it...so work on it as soon as you start playing.

I must admit...there are enemy ships that come out of nowhere and even if you shoot them in time, they burst into tiny little homing missiles (I called them little butterflies in an earlier post...thats what they look like to me...meh). This single enemy was responsible for about 80% of my deaths...trying to avoid them while fighting other enemies.

*shakes fist*

I now rate this game 8/10 overall...and I still say, your ship never has enough firepower with the amount of overwhelming enemies/bosses your up against. I dunno, maybe I'm just spoiled.

postman · Post by **postman** » Thu Feb 15, 2007 10:49 pm

Anyone reach level five's boss yet (the factory?). This is quite a pain, as you need to circle the main piece as it spits tons of bullets out at you.

Last boss is quite a pain also.....lots of enemies appear out of nowhere, I hate that...

Klatrymadon · Post by **Klatrymadon** » Thu Feb 15, 2007 11:19 pm

What I said earlier about the pod rotation wasn't quite true; as you all now know, R handles clockwise movement. It does still feel oddly unnatural, however, and again, it's not very good for on-the-fly bullet-catching. As Robotron implies, though, you never really need it for that anyway...

Kaede · Post by **Kaede** » Fri Feb 16, 2007 10:19 am

Got to play this last night and.....it's not good. Invisi-bullets, Amiga graphics and a brutal introduction to the game had me reaching for the off button after 5 minutes.

This is still too amateur in it's execution to be considered anything other than home-brew IMHO.

dczx · Post by **dczx** » Sat Feb 17, 2007 6:11 am

Well, I got to play it yesterday. As a veteran of R-Type I, II, Delta & Final, and Last Resort, I can say that I really like this game. The difficulty is very intense, at least in normal mode, but it's a challenge that engages me quite a bit. I've made it to the level 2 boss so far. The graphics are very nice. The music is very laid back but engaging.

To me, this is what the modern iteration of R-type should look like. I really enjoy the challenge. I know that's not for everyone, but I see there's also an easy and very easy mode. I still remember how much I hated the original R-type the first few times I played it in an arcade.

In this day and age of endless FPS's, extremely expensive consoles and increasing sameness in gameplay. I find this to be a fresh take on an original concept. On top of that, it's just cool getting to play a new release on my Dreamcast. No reason to buy a PS3 for me right now!

Strider77 · Post by **Strider77** » Sat Feb 17, 2007 8:48 pm

LOL... this game is harsh but I don't think it's awful like some say. I might think different to a degree if it didn't let you save your progress but it's deffinately not a walk in the park.

I got a chance to play it last night... My only gripe is the graphics are a bit on the dark side. I mean this is home brew but it's fairly impressive for a home brew title.

What I'd like to ask the developers. Do they themselves find the game difficult, can they beat it easily?

Klatrymadon · Post by **Klatrymadon** » Sat Feb 17, 2007 9:58 pm

Nice one, dczx - good to see another chap who's really enjoying it! I doubt we'll change many minds, though. I'm currently revisiting R-Type Delta and going for the 1CC, and I'm finding that dramatically easier to get through than this, so I guess the game is just unlikely to win over any new fans (to this largely-untapped style of gameplay). Moreover, it's clearly not interested in doing so, for better or worse!